


Naming and Being

by Viridian5



Category: Saiyuki
Genre: Canon - Manga, Drama, Gen, Saiyuki Reload Blast
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-16
Updated: 2019-03-16
Packaged: 2019-11-18 22:27:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18127292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Viridian5/pseuds/Viridian5
Summary: What’s in a name? Sometimes more than you initially thought.





	Naming and Being

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for “Kouten: Part 3, Shot 4”; small spoilers for some events in _Saiyuki_ volumes 7-9. Beta and part of the summary by Akira 17.

“It’ll be weird calling you ‘Genjo’ when we’re with Sharak,” Goku said.

“It’ll be weird getting called that,” Sanzo replied.

“But not as weird as getting called ‘Gen-san,’ ‘Gen-tan,’ or ‘Gen-pyon’?”

“Tch. Don’t even start.”

“But all this really made me realize that ‘Sanzo’ isn’t really your name, it’s your title and job. I knew that but I didn’t really _know_ it.”

“It’s what I’ve asked the three of you to call me, and it’s what I’m most likely to answer to.”

“But, I mean, it would be like me telling everyone to call me ‘Stick Guy.’”

“Or ‘Glutton.’”

“That one’s fair,” Goku smiled as he heard Sanzo snort, “but it’s still not my _name_. And ‘Genjo Sanzo, the 31st of China’ is kind of a title too, not your name.”

“A lot of the time you should just call people what they tell you to call them.”

“Not all the time?”

“For example, take someone who demands you call him and see him as ‘Kami-sama,’ when he’s actually a deluded, dangerous, murderous man-child with delusions of grandeur. Do you go along with his ego trip and call him ‘Kami-sama’?”

Ukoku Sanzo had a big role in twisting “Kami-sama” into becoming that, but still. “Nooooo. Man, you had that one _ready_.”

Sanzo smiled a little around his cigarette. He’d been smiling a bit more than usual since they’d met and hung around with Sharak Sanzo, something that made Goku super happy. Goku hoped they’d get a lot of time to like each other and talk Sanzo stuff together, something Sanzo didn’t get much of otherwise.

Still. “But you’re not just a Sanzo, there’s more to you than that.”

“Of course.”

“So it seems kinda....” Sad. Though Sanzo probably wouldn’t react well to hearing that. 

“I had what you’d consider a name, but it died with my master. I’ve been ‘Sanzo’ ever since you met me. With the way the three of you say it, you especially, it might as well be a name. It’s fine.”

One of his murdered dad’s last actions was proclaiming him “Genjo Sanzo, the 31st of China,” so Goku could see why Sanzo would be attached to the idea. He didn’t really know what he thought talking to Sanzo about this would make Sanzo _do_. 

It’s just that he’d gotten a sudden terrible thought where he wondered if Sanzo could really handle it, personal identity-wise, if something stopped him from being a Sanzo anymore.

 

### End

 **Note:** The word “Sanzo” doesn’t even mean anything to me anymore. Sanzo, Sanzo, Sanzo....


End file.
